Sorensen: The wounded who never die

[RamboLiberal]

http://www.sfgate.com/columnists/sorensen/

If we were to believe our government (and who does?), our military doctors are the best in the world. Nobody ever dies in their care.

Common sense tells us we're being lied to again.

If you follow the news even loosely, you know that American soldiers and Marines are killed and wounded on a daily basis in Iraq. Just offhand, the number of wounded appears to be three times the number killed. So, roughly -- very roughly -- one can estimate about 1,000 troops wounded in Iraq. It could be twice that, or more. I think it's a lot more.

If the wounds are minor, Sgt. Mike says, the troops are patched up in Iraq and sent back to their units. Troops with major injuries are flown to Germany for treatment, and from there to the United States.

But, judging from press reports, none of these wounded ever dies. Maybe I don't know where to look, but I haven't been able to find one single report of a soldier who died later of his or her injuries.

[Screaming Lord Byron]

1. I'd heard it was 2,148 wounded since operations began.

I think that's from Lunaville

[Vitruvius]

2. And if 1 in 10 wounded die, that's about 200 dead -- above & beyond the

'official' death toll.

Does anybody have up-to-date info on the fraction of wounded who die?

Incidentally, during the Vietnam war, soldiers who were wounded one week and died the next were not counted as combat deaths. Which is why the "combat deaths" in Vietnam were a bit over 50,000, but the total US death toll was closer to 80,000.

So if the Bu$h administration is fudging the casualty figures by no more than LBJ's administration did, you can take the official combat deaths and multiply by 1.6

Incidentally, you can also e-mail any info you may have to Harley Sorensen at [e-mail] or by clicking his by-line in the article.

[karlschneider]

3. I've tried to get an answer on this for months. Here's a little

:kick: